Stalzer/Obele Family Blog

We are back home.

Business live has taken me again into its grip. Tonight, I am flying back to Zürich.

Everything went well on the flight back. Everything,… well… Here is a sight you normally don’t want to see

I have to write some more details about the 7.5 hrs delay…

Going through the photos, I found a couple really beautiful night pictures. These are my favorites

Today, after going to the Pitcher plant pond, we decided to stay here at the lake.

The boys were fishing from the dock with small hooks and bread. In the past days, they caught 20…30 fish each day. The fish are rather small and the boys let them always go. They have and had lots of fun (Of course I could sneak away for a couple minutes to write into the blog)

Here are some photos

Grandpa watched over them

They caught something every couple minutes

Sometimes the fish would go below the deck and grandpa needs to help

Yesterday we learned how to make “Smores”. “Smores” are a bottom cracker, a piece of chocolate, a grilled marshmellow and a second cracker on top. When you eat one and the gooey marshmellow holds your teeth together and you are trying to say “Some More” – you’ll get a “Smore”

First of all, we had to start a fire to be able to grill marshmellows. Of cource we didn’t use matches but our outdoor fire starters.

Then we had to prepare the ingredients for the “Smores”

To get the fire really started, the boys were blowing into the flames

Rachel was preparing the sticks to grill the marshmellows

Then we all had  smores and I fogot to take photos on how yummy they are.

Instead of another “gone fishing” report, I am going to write a little bit about the plant and animal life we encountered at the lake

First of all – No, we haven’t seen any moose or bear (yet)

Let’s begin with the pitcher plant. The pitcher plant is a meat-eating plant, which has several tubes on its bottom where insects fall in, can’t get out and are digested. The plant itself reminds a little bit of an orchid. If you are very silent, you can hear it munching (just kidding)

Some pictures of our “house-rabbit”

A little toad on the side of the tracks

Squirrels were always looking for food

Also all sorts of fish like a sunfish

And last but not least – “Buck, the singing dear” He knows the tunes to the theme song of “Rawhide”

Of course, we saw a lot more animals like butterflies, fireflies, squirrels, rabbits, etc. However, not all of the were sitting still so I could take a photo.

After our scenic ride with Katahdin air, we grabbed two canoes and went fishing.

Just some impressions from the trip… (btw – it was raining some time)

Mount Katahdin in the clouds

We got a packed lunch in a cooler and enjoyed it on "Painter’s beach"

Two loons were watching our fishing efforts. Every now and then, they would come real close, look at what we are doing and dipping their heads into the lake. As if they wanted to say - "You have to look first, where the fish are…" Also two eagles were watching out efforts

We caught a few white fish, which are not really tasteful and one (1!) brook trout - Delicous.

Some more pictures of the professional fishermen.

Yesterday evening, the boys found a little snake below our cabin…

Don’t worry, I took the image with a 300mm Zoom

Today in the morning we booked a scenic flight with Katahdin Air. Katahdin Air operates a Cessna 206 on floats is the only connection from the wilderness camp to Millinocket. Except you want to hike, of course

Jim flew in this morning to pick us up. Although the weather wasn’t looking too good, we started on the ride. We were not disappointed.

Let me just add some impressions of the flight around Mount Katahdin. Jim explained all the places and lakes and mountains. However, I don’t remember them all.

When we came back, Mike, who has been working here for 4 years, is returning "to the real world and getting a real job" (Just kidding, he is a very nice guy who will be a Latin teacher from now on). He had his things being flown out of the camp. One of his possesions is a canoe which definetely would not fit into one of the luggage lockers of the plane. So - the easy way to do it, is to strap it on the side of the Cessna.

Yesterday evening, we got invited to have a look at Holly’s kitchen. Holly is our host at the Katahdin wilderness camp and serves extremely well prepared meals. We are getting spoiled every day.

The Wilderness Camp has (almost) no electricity, so cooking is with gas or wood. Her oven is a “current” model of the wood-burining type and serves as an oven and as a heater at the same time

The stove has a water deposit on the right side, so even warm water is available all day long in winter time…

Her second major appliance is a gas oven (a little more modern).

Even toast can be prepared on this special toaster for the ovens

Her husband Bryce uses part of the kitchen as his office.

He has his computer at the solar panel outlet. This is the only place in the house with electricity, however only if the sun was out for the day.

Here are some images of the dinner tonight. As a starter we had our “catch of the day” – A single roasted trout (I have to question our fishing skills..) Unfortunately, I forgot to take some images.

The main course was beef stuffed with mushrooms cooked in red wine with herbs (I think) with Squash and Zuccini and Potatoes. As desert, we had an apple cake with whipped cream.

Thank you Holly for all the cooking during the time we are here. It was (and is) wonderful.

Today in the morning, the lake was like a mirror. I shot about 3GB worth of pictures… (approx. 300 pictures  in raw Format)

I am still looking through the photos. This is my current favorite (HDR processed and optimized) (I need a new computer – the HDR processing takes about 20 minutes per photo)

Update to the report from yesterday – Felix wrote his name in stones

The boys and my dad are playing Monopoly on the IPad and I am taking a few minutes to tell you a little bit about our trip.

Yesterday, we left the civilization. One of the last views were a squirrel behind the railroad tracks behind our hotel. We stayed at the Hilton in Freeport (200m from L.L.Bean and the shopping paradises). We had running water, yacuzzi, electric light, TV, Telephone, etc. all of the things, that will not be available in the next week.

Fortunately, we have a SUV to pack all of our stuff

On the way to the Baxter Park, we stopped at some lakes to get a view and a feeling of the lakes in Maine.

Finally, we reached the Avalanche field and packed up to go to the Wilderness Camp at the lake.

We passed some amazing places and it was a nice hike (except the backpack, which felt like 200kg after the first hundred meters)

Finally we reached the lake. I didn’t take any more pictures inbetween because I was just exhausted.

We reached the camp in perfect sunshine

After getting settled in, the boys had to check out the dock and the fish below. The are some Perch, which nibbled their fingers

Dad and I used the time to relax

We checked out the other cabins and found that we are living close to the wildlife…

Some more impressions from the camp

Today we started real early. The boys woke up at shortly after 6am. This is however explainable as we went to bed at around 9pm yesterday evening.

The boys had to checkout the lake right away to see if it is still there…

After breakfast, we took the canoes to go fishing. I didn’t take the camera with me, as I wasn’t too confident in our boating skills and I didn’t want to search for the camera at the bottom of the lake. All my fears were superficial as nothing exciting happend on the boats (except for pretty strong wind, that always drifted us in direction of the shore…)

We went to the Lake Katahdin outlet and we caught some trouts (Felix 2, Max 1, Granddad 3 and I had 1 catch). However, only one was within the length restrictions.

The guys are now real fishing experts and  had to try out their new skills on the beach as well.

Tonight, we had our “catch of the day” for dinner – Just kidding – our catch was the appetizer and Holly made a delicious roasted chicken for dinner.

I am sitting between a couple of backpacks and a sixpack “Samuel Adams". Behind me are 3 snoring “Gentlemen” (my dad and the boys) and I try to resolve my thoughts on the days to come. I try to get comfort from the mallorquin proverb ”poc a poc” which means  - one step at a time… we’ll see.

However – let’s start at the beginning.

Yesterday morning, the boys and I started on our vacation adventure trip. We are planning to go to the Katahdin Wilderness Camps and a trip like that needs to be prepared. We flew out to Zürich, met my dad, flew to Boston, stayed a night, took a car to Freeport, continue on to Millinocket, drive to Baxter state park, hike for 2 hours to finally get to our “Resort”.

Doesn’t sound like your typical “All-Inclusive” holiday…

So, yesterday – wow it was only yesterday, but I have a feeling it is already a million miles away -  we packed our bags at started our adventure.

Helga drove us to the airport and off we went. We flew with “Edelweiss Air” to Zürich and I must say – compared with all the other charter operators – impressive !!

In Zürich, we met my Dad, who was flying in from Stuttgart, and we took the train down to Zürich Downtown.

In Zürich, we met with Peter and had a walk to the Zürich Lake. Of course, we had to watch all the Chinese and Japanese tourists. We also had a chance to take an infinite loop picture (him taken a picture of me taken a picture of him taken a picture of me…)

We also saw a wild eagle making his rounds around the lake.

After another hour of sweating in Downtown, we went back to the airport to the departure gate. Our flight was about half an hour late, so it was easy to motivate the boys to make some faces. Make an educated guess, what they are trying to express.

Finally we got to board the aircraft and the boys immediately discovered the features of the IFE (In Flight Entertainment)

After a couple more “boring” hours, we finally got to Boston. After some negotiations, we got a nice SUV as a rental car. A Dodge Durango with all the bells and whistles. Grandpa has to train a little bit to get into the car…

We got to our hotel and the boys were falling into the bed. Grandpa and I had some “Samuel Adams”, some chips and we went to sleep as well.

The night was short, as my fellow travellers got up around 5:30 and of course had the courtesy of letting me sleep in (I am kidding, the noise could have woken an elephant…)

So after breakfast, we drove to downtown Boston. We got into the typical large city traffik jam at 8:30 (Oh boy – did I mention, this was early, we were at 06:45 at breakfast…)

We finally got to do some shopping and watch the sky scrapers. Here are some impressions:

We continued on to Freeport, got into a real nice luxury hotel, did some shopping, had a lobster for dinner and just had a good time. Unfortunately, I forgot the camera in the car…

The boys and granddad are snoring in the background and I will now get to bed as well. Tomorrow we plan to drive to Millinocket for the next part of the adventure.

Jetzt sind die Tage wieder länger; man sitzt abends draussen und nicht immer hat man Lust den Grill anzuschmeissen. Es dauert zu lang, die Kohlen sind aus, usw.

Nun lief uns ein Weber Genesis E320 als Schnäppchen (Ha Ha) bei dem Magatzem Verd über den Weg. Und wir haben zugeschlagen

Jetzt gibt es keine Entschuldigung mehr – es wird angeheizt.

Der Grill hat neben dem Rost noch ein Kochfeld.

Ein paar Leistungsdaten – der Grill hat 13.5kW und das Kochfeld weiter 3.5kW. Ich bin mal gespannt, wie lange die Gasflasche hält.

Ten more day to go until we leave for our hard-earned vacation.

The boys have new backpacks, new shoes and new knifes.

I think, we should start preparing for the trip.

Das Wortspiel konnte ich mir jetzt nicht verkneifen…

Aber mal der Reihe nach. Ich war letzte Woche in Zürich bei Peter. Peter ist begeisterter “Aquaristiker” und hat uns mit dem “Fischvirus” infiziert. Peter war vorletzte Woche bei einer Züchterin von Paradieser und hat uns sechs Prachtexemplare mitgebracht.

Heute morgen bin ich von Zürich zurückgeflogen und habe die Paradieser, ein paar Antennenwelse, ein paar Schnecken, eine Wurzel und ein paar Seemandelblätter sowie jede Menge Tipps, Antworten, Anregungen und Informationen.

Von der Vorbereitung zur Reise habe ich leider keine Bilder, da die Kamera auf Peters Wohnzimmertisch liegt.

Um es vorweg zu nehmen. Alle Fische haben den Flug überlebt und sind putzmunter.

Hier ein Bild, nachdem die Fische Temperaturmässig akklimatisiert waren.

Parallel hierzu kam die Treibholzwurzel für 30 Minuten in den Dampfgarer, um sich mit Feuchtigkeit vollzusaugen und mögliche Bakterien abzutöten.

Und hier nun ein paar Bilder von den Fischen im Aquarium

Unsere Katzen (besonders Krümmel) fanden die neuen Mitbewohner natürlich auch sehr interessant